Bill Whitehouse started out racing Coopers in 500cc events and from there he moved to Formula Two, taking part in several non-championship Formula One events, as well as the 1954 British Grand Prix where an oil leak forced him to retire after four laps. He stopped racing in 1955 when F2 was temporarily cancelled, but resumed in 1957 when he bought a Cooper-Climax. At Reims that July his car broke down in practice, but he was lent a similar one. Early on in the race it left the track after a tyre burst, somersaulted and burst into flames. Whitehouse died soon afterwards in hospital. Later in the same race the American Herbert MacKay-Fraser was also killed. Whitehouse owned and ran Westmount Garage in Blendon, Kent, which was later the base for the Gemini Formula Junior Team.